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zAmong the Trees Again 












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COPYRIGHT 1902 

THE BOWEN-MERRILL COMPANY 

OCTOBER 



TffTL ld ' ffl.tY"b ' a 
CONORE88, 



C'AHbC\ XXo No. 






I 1 * 



Jo the memory of my beloved brother 
Ortb Harper Stein 



CONTENTS 



AMONG THE TREES AGAIN 


3 


APRIL CONTRADICTIONS 


21 


APRIL MORNING 


8 


AS TO THE SUMMER A1K Till Rl 


31 


AT NIGHT 


60 


BETWEEN SEASONS 


40 


BINDWEED 


46 


PA' THE KANKAKEE 


64 


CACTUS LAND, THE 


67 


CASCADE RAVINE, THE 


71 


DREAM ECHOES 


20 


EARLY NOVEM ! 


79 


FISHER FOLK, THE 


86 


FOREBODING 


74 


GOLDEN WEDDING, THE 


78 


HOME FIELDS, THE 


52 


IDEALS 


30 


IMPATIENT 


66 


IN LATE SEPTEMBER 


75 


IN SUMMER DEEPS 


54 


IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 


16 


IN THE MOONLIGHT 


45 


JANUARY THAW 


84 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

JUNE 42 

LAST SURVIVOR FROM THE LIFE BOAT, THE 69 

LITTLE LOVE SONG, A 41 

LITTLE SISTER, THE 88 

MONTEZUMA 38 

MORNING ON THE MOUNTAINS 85 

MY LITTLE MASTER 12 

NORTHMEN'S SONG OF THE POLE, THE 14 

ON HEARING THE BALLAD "ALLEN PERCY" 11 

ON THE PRAIRIE 62 

OVER THE SIERRA 61 

PERFECT FRIENDSHIP, THE 83 

PLEA, A 22 

RAIN ON THE RIVER 59 

REDBIRD, THE 6 

SEA-DREAMS 28 

SEA-GARDENS OF SANTA CATALINA, THE 89 

SONG 55 

SONG OF THOUGHT, A 44 

SUMMER SHOWER, THE 49 

SUNNY NOON 77 

SYMPATHY 53 
TO THE "WINGED VICTORY OF SAMOTHRACE" 31 

THRUSH, THE 36 

WHEREFORE WINGS ? 81 

WINTRY TINTS 82 

WISHING-SPRING, THE 7 

WOOD FANCY, A 35 



e/lmong the Trees Again 



/ saw a meadow-land one day; 

The grass stood green and high, 
But naught appealed in any way 

To stay the passer-by. 

Till suddenly the sunlight strayed 
Those leafy tangles through, 

And touched to fire, on every blade 
A golden network grew! 

A million airy cobzvcbs gleamed 

So silken-soft and bright, 
That all the level lowland seemed 

A tracery of light. 

And as I watched the webs, I thought 

The Held of life along, 
As slight as these, so I have wrought 

With slender threads of song. 

They bind the grass, and blossoms, too, 

The bee and butterfly, 
And some go faintly wavering through 

The tender azure sky. 



Yet still I wait that golden glow 
Whose fine transmuting art 

Must smite my web of song, and so 
Reveal it to the heart. 

Ah therefore, thou, I pray thee, touch 
These frail threads I have spun, 

With grace of sympathy, for such 
Might light them like the sun! 



AMONG THE TREES AGAIN 

Aye, throb, my heart ! is it not sweet to be, 
To breathe, to bide, by growing things once more ! 
We did not guess before 
How close our life was locked in greenery. 
Hark ! how the sparrows in the apple tree 

Are chattering, chirping, till their tiny throats 
Are fairly brimmed and quivering through and 
through 

With rollick notes ! 
Good morrow, little birds ! 
Good morrow ! morrow ! — O, I would I knew 

Some light-winged language, kindred singing 
words 

Wherein to say 
This day, this day, at last this happy day 
I come to be a neighbor unto you ! 

Too long, too long, we heard strange footsteps pass, 

Harsh, strident echoes stricken out of stone; 
But never softened by green, growing grass, 
Or mellowed to faint, earthy undertone. 
And then, O heart, 
Did we not ofttimes feel ourselves apart, 
Alone, 
Wrought to vague discord by some touch un- 
known ? 

3 



AMONG THE TREES AGAIN 



Did we not weary with a nameless grief, 
In dreaming of tall clover, daisy sown, 
Or music blown 
From the wind-harping of some little leaf? 

It was not that within the city's core 

There dwelt no sympathies, nor interests keen, 
No human ties to temper its fatigues. 
— 'Twas only that we needed something more; 

Some note rang wrong; 
A foolish fancy, may be, but still strong, 
That life sang sweeter snatched between the green 
Close-lapping verdure of a fret of twigs. 

Where all the ground was paven out of sight, 
And only from a far-off strip of sky 

My mother Nature strove to speak to me, 
I could not harken to her voice aright ; 
I knew not why, 
But ever to mine ears some whispering tree 
Seemed of the inmost golden soul of her, 
The best interpreter. 
And so what wonder, Life, that you and I, 
Shut out from such glad confidence, should miss 
And grieve for this. 

— But all this yearning we'll forget; for now 
Within my window, 
So, 
By finger-tips, 
I'll draw into mine arms this dancing bough, 
And stroke its silky buds across my lips. 



AMONG THE TREES AGAIN 



O generous-natured, friendly, neighbor tree! 

Weave gentle blessings in the shade and shine; 
And granting gracious patience to my plea, 
Some simple lesson of your lore make mine, 
Make mine, I pray! 
O, be a kindly teacher unto me, 

And I'll pour out such worshipful heart-wine, 
Not any bird that sings to you all day, 

Or nestles to low, leafy lullaby, 
Shall hold you in such dear observance, nay, 
Nor love you half so tenderly as I. 



THE REDBIRD 



THE REDBIRD 

Swept lightly by the south wind 
The elm leaves softly stirred, 

And in their pale green clusters 
There straightway bloomed a bird ! 

His glossy feathers glistened 

With dyes as richly red 
As any tulip flaming 

From out the garden bed. 

But ah, unlike the tulips, 
In joyous strain, ere long, 

This redbird flower unfolded 
A heart of golden song ! 



THE WISHING-SPRING 



THE WISHING-SPRING 

I knelt beside the fairy spring, 
Among the tasseled weeds; 

Far off, with dreamy murmuring, 
The wind piped through the reeds. 

Once, twice, the brimming cup I raised 

With trembling finger-tips, 
And in its limpid crystal gazed, 

Nor laid it to my lips. 

Ah me ! the eager heart-desires, 
So thronging swift they came, 

My spirit surged like wind-swept fires, 
I knew not which to name. 

— Then all at once, I quickly quaffed 

The shining drops ; but lo, 
The wish with that enchanted draught 

No man must ever know ! 



APRIL MORNING 



APRIL MORNING 

I lean upon the bridge's rail, 

In idle joy, and gazing down, 
So watch the frothy bubbles sail, 
And bits of tangled grasses trail 
Along the current's tawny brown. 

The river flows at full to-day; 
And though within the tide it pours 
There grow no mocking sycamores. 
Nor any crystal hints betray 

The spicewood thickets, nor the pale 
Soft willow wands of pearly gray, 
Whose interwoven mazes veil 
The fretted banks, yet here and there, 
Adown some swirling eddy, where 
A delving sunbeam shines, 
What mines 
Of gleaming, streaming, liquid gold 
The waters hold ! 

And so, by rapid currents rolled 

In billowy swells that break and chime 
In riotous tumult uncontrolled, 
The March flood plashes past the pier; 
But through its sweeping tones, I hear 



APRIL MORNING 



The sweet, receding murmurs rhyme 
The burden of the April time ; 

And throbbing like a glad refrain, 
Now far, now full, now far again, 
The freshened breeze 
Blows gaily, bringing pure and clear 
The fitful, tinkling cadences. 

But listen ! faint, from out the sheer 
Deep borders of the morning sky, 
Slips down the distance-softened cry 
Of shy wild geese that northward fly; 
It vibrates nearer, and more near, 
— And see! 
There ! wheeling into sight. 
Far as the vision may descry, 

A level-winged advancing "V," 
They keep their swift, unswerving flight. 
North, north, beyond that scudding fleece 
Of tiny clouds, like wilder geese, 

That join their ranks, and journey, too, 
On, — on, — into the farthest blue. 

Then, from the boundless space above, 
I drop my dazzled eyes to view 
The soft field-grass and meadow-rue, 
The restful, brown earth, that I love. 

A trick of blinding sun, maybe, 
That halo on the hills may prove — 
And yet, they are so dear to me, 
The golden glory that they wear 
Is like none other anywhere, 
And, in my heart, I hold it true. 



APRIL MORNING 



Though, surely, what least loving eye 

Could wander up the river there, 
And see aught otherwise than I? 
Or could deny 
That yonder little glimpse is fair? 
The slender point of jutting land 

Where, faintly burgeoning anew 
With rounds of downy buds, there stand 
A score of water-willow trees 
In clustered tufts, and twinkling through, 
Across the stream, beside of these, 
A line of shining yellow light ; 

And half in sight, 
And hidden half, upon the right, 

By wild red-sumac shrubberies, 
A windmill, rising tall and white, 
Slow turning in the breeze. 

And then beyond — but how express, 
What word in any tongue conveys 
The depth of dreamy tenderness 
That laps, and wraps, and overlays 
The far blue hills, 
And spills and fills 
The valleys with pale purple haze? 
O, what sweet syllables confess 

The glad heart-happiness that plays 
Through all my pulses as I gaze, 
And drink the beauty, past all praise — 
The old, immortal blessedness 
Of April days! 



ON HEARING THE BALLAD "ALLEN PERCY" n 



ON HEARING THE BALLAD " ; ALLEN PERCY" 

A plaintive song, so strangely sweet and old, 
That all my soul within itself would fold 

And gently keep so quaint a melody, 
That like a bird's its notes of liquid gold 

Might oft repeat their sweetness unto me. 

A tale of joyless splendor long ago, 
Of wedded lady and of loveless woe, 

How she to soothe her sick heart's misery 
Cradled in vines her little child, and so 

Sang of dear love beneath a greenwood tree. 

And through it all there runs such saddest plaint, 
As sweet as lutes, now murmurous, now faint, 

Till, like the far-heard sighing of the sea, 
It sweeps in gathering passion past restraint, 

Then breaks, and croons in mournful minor key. 

Ah, well-a-day ! I listen breathless till 
I half believe that sorrowing singer still 

Dreams on divinely by the whispering tree ; 
For in your voice all tenderest heart-strings thrill, 

And all the woodland's marvelous minstrelsy! 



MY LITTLE MASTER 



MY LITTLE MASTER 

little poet, winging through 
The sheer, clear blue, 

Is it the sky you're singing to? 
Or is it that afar you see 
Some leafy, laden apple-tree, 
And half concealed and half confessed, 
A nest? 
Ah, truly now, I would I knew 
The happy secret of your glee, 
That joy wherewith you birds are blest, 
Red-breast ! 

So airy and so light of wing, 
You soar and sing, 

1 pray, could you not softly fling, 

My merry minstrel, down to me 
Some echo of that melody 
That spills from out your tiny bill? 
Some trill 
Of all those liquid tones that ring 
So full of purest poetry, 
That rhyme, and chime, and thrill, until 
They fill 



MY LITTLE MASTER 



These vibrant seas of azure air, 
Whose blue tides bear 
Their witching sweetness everywhere? 
O little master, heed to me! 
And ah, so true, so tenderly, 
I'll learn to sing how lovely grows 
This rose. 
Till, by and by, dear heart, I'll dare 
To touch some bolder note, maybe, 
Some chord whence deeper music flows; 
Who knows ? 



THE NORTHMEN'S SONG OF THE POLE 



THE NORTHMEN'S SONG OF THE POLE 

The roar of the seas where the freezing clouds lower, 
The shriek of the storm-wind, the turbulent tide, 

The conquering currents, all vaunt of their power, 
And taunt with the centuries' secret they hide. 

Of towering icebergs and glittering floes, 
The sun of the midnight in luminous rings, 

Of hopes held at bay by beleaguering snows, 
Of man in his weakness the fierce ocean sings. 

Bright over the sky the aurora is red, 

And crimson as life-blood the snowflakes below; 
Swift updarting streamers of fire overspread 

All heaven and earth with a roseate glow. 

Hark ! Hark ! to the rumble, the thunderous roar 
Of the ancient ice-mountains that shatter and rend 

And crash with the tide dashing up on the shore, 
In turmoil titanic and toil without end. 

O, woe to the ship that the pitiless clutch 
Of those crushing ice-demons drags down to her 
doom! 

The path to the pole is o'er-scattered with such, 
And deep sleep the heroes the tempests entomb. 



THE NORTHMEN'S SONG OF THE POLE 15 



Beneath the wan moon of the long arctic night 

The frost-smitten sea stretches boundless and lone ; 

The Shores of the Dead Men loom spectral and 
white, 
In Helheim, the death-goddess waits for her own. 

But ho, to her hatred ! the soul of the brave 
He bears not who dares not her fury defy ! 

And ho, to her giants of wind and of wave ! 
We crave but to meet and defeat them, or die ! 



Farewell, and farewell !— the anchor rope strains, 
Loose cable and canvas, and hasten we forth ! 

The fire of desire quivers hot in our veins, 
We must sail with the gale, to the north! to the 
north ! 

Must speed with the blast to its ultimate goal, 
The path of its pinions must follow and find 

The lure of the ages, the boreal pole, 
And the measureless halls of the house of the 
wind ! 



IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 



IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 

O golden day, wherein at last, 
Long leagues and wintry overpast, 
I stand beneath a sky as blue 
As April violets drenched in dew, 
And live within a dream come true! 

From rosy-berried pepper-trees 
The winds blow spicy fragrances ; 
The palms sway softly to and fro, 
And down below, 
Between the glossy leaves of these, 

The sparkling, yellow sunbeams steep 
The mission garden, where the bees 

Are hoarding deep 
Of heliotrope that hangs the wall 
As for some princely festival, 

While white and tall 
Bright lilies bloom in grace untold, 
And those rare roses, passing all 
In splendor, called 'The Cloth of Gold !" 

O heart, my heart, throb high and fast 
With rapture! for how couldst thou know 
Amid the far-off frost and snow 



IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 17 

Where all the skies are overcast 
And shrill and chill the north-winds blow, 
How couldst thou know 
December heavens anywhere 
Could show such rare 
Such tender and divinest guise, 
That earth and air 
Could weave such strange, resistless spell 
As this that folds us flower-wise 
At sweet San Gabriel ! 



San Gabriel ! the holy words 
Fall soft as music on the ear ; 
I think they are as sweet to hear 
As any song of summer birds ; 
And harkening them, the while in clear, 

Pure, quivering notes, 
The ancient bells begin to chime, 
In shadowy- wise before me floats 
A vision of the vanished time. 

I see again 
The little band from sunny Spain, 
Those godly ones, and full of grace, 
And without stain, 
Who, heeding neither toil nor pain. 
Desiring men of every race, 
That such might see sweet Jesus' face, 

And that at length the Lord might reign 
Among all peoples, even so, 
Sought in the wilderness this place, 
And consecrated, long ago. 



1 8 IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 

And gazing on the sacred pile 

Their hands upreared in loving zeal, 
My heart goes forth to them the while, 

Those faithful fathers, true and leal ! 
How oft along each cloistered aisle 

They counted o'er and o'er their beads, 
While in this garden, unawares, 

The fragrant flowers sowed their seeds. 
— And richly as the flowers, the prayers 

Bore fruit in gentle deeds ! 

In arched embrasures, lifted high 

Against the sky, 
The bells in clear-cut beauty show ; 
And loftier still, surmounting all, 
And blessing thus the ancient wall, 
A cross, — and on its summit, lo ! 
A slender bird with pearly breast 
Sits peacefully at rest ! 

Ah me ! Ah me ! I know not why 
This little bird with folded wings, 

The cross, the tender azure sky, 
Their pure, exceeding beauty brings 

Swift tears, and smites my heart, till I 
Am almost fain 
To hide mine eyes for very pain ! 

Yet though thus for a little space 

I bow my face, 

Nor any grace 
Of rose or lily can I see, 
I know the while that memory, 



IN THE MISSION GARDEN, SAN GABRIEL 19 

Clear-eyed and free, 
Upon my heart is graving deep 
Each least, sweet loveliness, to keep 
Through all the coming years for me. 

And it shall be, 
In afterwhiles, when far away, 
When wintry skies are bleak and gray 

And no birds sing, 
I shall grow glad remembering 
The sweetness of this scarlet day. 



DREAM ECHOES 



DREAM ECHOES 

A little while ago I caught, 
In cadence pure and clear, 

A waft of faintest music, wrought 
Upon my inner ear. 

A part of some elusive theme 
Whose sweetly solemn air 

My soul had harkened in a dream, 
I know not when nor where. 

I only know my heart-strings stirred 
With strange, forgotten pain, 

That crept upon me as I heard 
That un remembered strain. 

A sense of loneliness untold, 
So boundless, deep, unknown, 

I blindly reached my hands to hold 
Your palms within my own ! 






APRIL CONTRADICTIONS 



APRIL CONTRADICTIONS 

I watch the little pear buds break 

And slip their silky sheaths, 
And flowers on the maples make 
A thousand russet wreaths, 
— Then something blinds my sight, and I 
Am full of grief, yet know not why ! 

A rosy purple half betrays 

The wealth the lilacs fold ; 

The torches of the tulips blaze 

In flames of red and gold ; 

Peach boughs are blossoming above, 
— But oh, the vague heartache thereof ! 

The blue sky wears in gentle wise 

Its loveliness again; 
All April sunshine, — yet mine eyes 
Are brimmed with April rain! 
The presage of sweet days to be, 
So strange a sadness stirs in me ! 



A PLEA 



A PLEA 

Two years ago, it is two years to-day, — 
It seems a score ! — since that sweet, bloomy May 
When on the barren sea you sailed away. 
The peach-trees then were in a rosy glow, 

And down below, 
The tulip buds had just begun to show. 
— And yet, dear heart, I know 
Though all the heaven smiled in tender blue, 

It shone not so to you. 
Sorrow had hooded all your skies in gray, 
And when these dancing boughs put on their gay, 
Bright May-time bravery, they only grieved 
A heart bereaved. 
And though glad robins sang to you to stay, 

And by the stream the first sweet-flags unfurled 
Seemed nature's truce to sorrow, — every way 
Held warring memories wherewith to gainsay 
And send you wandering over half the world. 

Ah, well do I remember how my prayers 
Went with you, dear, and followed unawares; 
So speeding ever, winging far and wide 
About the path wherein your ship should ride, 
And pleading Heaven that most gentle airs 
And tempered tide 
Might bear you safely to the farther side. 



A PLEA 



Then, when I knew your voyage over, — then, 
— For surely now, at last, I may confess, 
Now that I have outgrown its bitterness, 
Though, sometimes, I can almost feel again, 
Remembering those days, that keen distress, 
Yes, jealousy it was ! not any less, 
That constantly 
Wrapped all my thoughts of you beyond the sea !— 
I feared lest other lives, more large and wide 
Than mine has been, might, day by day, divide 
And win your life and love away from me. 
And I was fearful for dear nature, too; 
I could not bear 
To think that heaven anywhere should wear 
A hue more deeply, more divinely blue 
Than this home sky that we together knew ; 
Or that there grew 
Strange bud or bloom to make the earth more fair. 

— A most unworthy fancy, it is true; 
Since nature is but nature everywhere, 
The same kind mother, in whatever land ; 
So too, maybe, could we but understand, 
All hearts and loves are only as a part 
Of one great Heart 
Whose universal pulses so expand 
That any lesser life that therein beats 

Should no more dream of this word "jealousy" 
Than yonder shining flakes of bloom should be 
Jealous, forsooth, of the whole hawthorn tree 
That is but one with their own mass of sweets. 



24 A PLEA 



And so, at last, through blind, unreasoning grief 
Beyond belief, 
Brightly within my heart there did uprise 
Love's loyalty, rebuking in this wise : 
"Has she not spoken, oft and oft again, 
These three plain words 'I love you' ? Wherefore, 
then, 

What right have you 
To deem mere distance could her love undo? 
To fancy aught exists that could estrange 
Her heart from yours, wherein there is no change, 
Or judge her own to be less simply true?" 

And then, in shame, I swiftly put aside 
All faintest questioning; thenceforth to abide 
In trust as pure, as boundless, and as wide 
As still sea-deeps, unvexed of any tide. 

Nay, I have learned to cherish rightly, too, 

All light and life that minister to you. 
I hold most dear 

Whatever least thing brings you smallest cheer; 
And, day by day, my ceaseless prayer is this, 

That from the changeful, many-colored grace 
Of time and place, 
Your grief may come to weave a chrysalis 

Round its dead hopes, till waking, by and by, 

It shall find wings to bear it to the sky. 
—But, dear,— God knows I would not do you 

wrong, 
Nor touch one heart-string if it be not strong, — 

But O, so long, 
So long it seems ! You have been gone so long ! 

The feather-grass is growing green and high, 



A PLEA 25 

And, piping gaily in an azure throng, 

The bluebirds spangle all the air with song; 

Again aflame the rosy peach boughs burn ; 

—Can not you, too, return? 

On slender stems the nodding wind-flowers blow, 
And bloodroots grow 
Where high the hedges fling their lacing frets 
Along the lanes ; while, softly sifting through 

Tall plumy weeds and silver spider-nets, 
The yellow sunbeams filter down below 

Until I know 
Not any fair Italian sky is blue 

As is our earth to-day with violets! 
Nor do I think that even that Syrian sun 

You watched ride high above Damascus' towers, 
In purer light or richer splendor glowed 
Than any one 
Of these most lovely golden dawns of ours 
That wake the birds along the river road. 
The green ravines are newly fringed with fern ; 
From out the brake a robin red-breast calls; 
The stream repeats, at rippling intervals, 
"Can you not now return?" 

But what avail in striving to compare 

Earth's endless beauties, whether east or west! 
All lands are lovely, and I am aware 
That unto me this little spot seems fair, 
More rare 
Than all the gathered glories of the rest, 
Because I love it best. 



26 A PLEA 



And so, in truth, I feel that chief I plead 

A selfish need; 
I too, like nature, long to greet the spring ! 
Indeed I think I never have confessed, 
Nor have you guessed 
How much of May it is your gift to bring. 
You never knew how wintry was the cloud 
Of haunting sadness, that would ofttimes shroud 
My inmost being, and creep up to chill 
The warmer currents of my life, — until, 

In knowing you, 
I felt a pulse like that sweet, joyous thrill 
That breaks the buds when all the skies are blue ! 
The bitter storms of grief I did not fear 

When you were near. 
But sometimes now I have grown half afraid 

That unforgotten frost of pain that used 
To wrap my nature will again invade 
The singing streams your April touch had 
loosed. 
Spring's subtler spells alone I can not learn, 
— Ah, will you not return? 

Yet if it chance that prayed-for peace you sought 
Be not at length to full perfection wrought, 
If still in vain 
Time strives with memory, — then, dear, I would 
fain 
Let be as naught 
All I have uttered; and I will refrain 
From any whispered wish, or word, or thought, 
That might to you in anywise complain. 



A PLEA 27 



However much my eager heart may miss, 
How much for you my very soul may yearn, 

I will seek patience, confident in this, 
That some time, surely, Love shall conquer pain, 
And then, dear heart, I know you will return. 



28 SEA-DREAMS 



SEA-DREAMS 

I sat upon the mossy rocks 

Beside the southern sea, 
While overhead the summer clouds 

Were drifting lazily. 

I watched their purple shadows trail 

Across the sea and hide 
Within the hollows of the waves 

That rode the rising tide. 

Sometimes the little flakes of foam 
Dashed up in twinkling spray ; 

And out along their silver paths 
The ships sailed far away. 

As through the sun I followed them 
With straining, eager eyes, 

From out the sparkling waves I saw 
A shining vision rise. 

It seemed a ghostly castle white, 
With battlement and tower, 

That hung on the horizon's verge 
By some unearthly power. 



SEA-DREAMS 29 



I saw its spectral turrets gleam 

As white as ivory, 
And wondered who the wizard king 

That reigned upon the sea. 

— But while, with breathless gaze, I watched 

This castle, by and by 
It vanished in the underworld 

Beyond the sea and sky! 



30 IDEALS 



IDEALS 

I would that I could weave a song 

As airy and as light, 
As are the roundelays that throng 

Within my heart to-night. 

I would that I might set to tune 

The beauty of this hour, 
When, like a primrose bud, the moon 

Breaks into golden flower. 

And all the happy, lilting notes, 

Beyond divinest words, 
That nestle in the downy throats 

Of little sleeping birds, 

The breeze-borne scent of mignonette, 

That in the garden grows, 
Where, strung like pearls, the dew is wet 

Upon the briar-rose, 

These things it is, whose voices I 

Have sought for overlong; 
Yet still their cunning tones defy 

The artifice of song. 



TO THE "WINGED VICTORY OF SAMOTHRACE" 31 



TO THE "WINGED VICTORY OF 
SAMOTHRACE" 

Thou wonder of the warrior prow, 

Supreme, immortal Victory ! 
Before thy majesty I bow 

And all my soul flames forth to thee ! 

Within the shadow of thy wings 

A thousand voices sound for me ; 
In far, tumultuous murmurings, 

I catch the echo of the sea ; 
The salty surge that rolls more near, 

Till loud and clear 
In mighty thunder tones I hear 

The rush of old JEgean tides, 
The bright, white waves that from the shore 
Sweep seaward with unceasing roar; 

In dawning skies the day-star guides, 
Across the surf the seabirds call, 

Whilst white and tall 
With swift sails swelling over all, 

The shield-hung warship rides. 

And like the heaven-born dreams that soar 
From hero spirits, eagle-wise, 
And urge to deeds of great emprise 
And fly before 



32 TO THE "WINGED VICTORY OF SAMOTHRACE' 

The eager, throbbing hearts that know 

No goal but victory, even so, 
Above the restless breakers' roar, 
Upon the high cliff evermore 

Thou standest with bright wings outspread, 

In all thy fresh-wrought godlihead, 
Beloved of the conqueror! 

And as I gaze I seem to trace 

The features of thy fearless face, 

The matchless marvel of its grace 
That like a star 

Across the seas of Samothrace 
Shone forth afar; 

I hear the southern winds intone 
Whilst backward blown 
Thy trailing garments, fluttering 
From out the slender girdle, cling 

About thy limbs and so confess 

Their lines of perfect loveliness; 
Then suddenly o'er everything 
Great shouts and martial echoes ring! 

I see thee, storm-like, rushing past 

Thy hand upon the carven mast, 
And harken whilst thy proud lips fling 

The loud, triumphal trumpet blast ! 

O glorious image ! what if time 
Hath smitten with ungentle touch 

Thy perfect beauty? Still sublime 
Thou art a conqueror, and still 

All men unite to name thee such ! 
Before thee all my pulses thrill, 



TO THE "WINGED VICTORY OF SAMOTHRACE' 



33 



Old hopes and dreams awake in me ; 
O Victory, 

Lead, lead but thou mine eager will, 

I follow fast and far until 
Some day my ship shall harbor thee ! 



34 AS TO THE SUMMER AIR THE ROSE 



AS TO THE SUMMER AIR THE ROSE 

As to the summer air the rose 

Pours forth her perfume all the day, 

For every careless wind that blows 
To scatter far away, 

So gives my heart to thee the rare 
Fine fragrance of its sweetest thought, 

And thou art heedless as the air 
Whereto the rose is naught! 



A WOOD FANCY 3 S 



A WOOD FANCY 

The mandrakes lift, like little mosques, 
Their domes between the vines, 

And butterflies for worshipers 
Are flocking to their shrines. 

And from tall, tapering mullein towers 

And minarets of green, 
The honey-bee muezzins drone 

To bloodroot buds between, 

That pilgrim-wise along the road 
Come trooping to the light, 

In pale green caftans closely wound 
And turbans spotless white. 

While all the way with budding things 

Is tufted thicker than 
The praying mats the Persian weaves 

In streets of Ispahan. 

And listen! with a lordly note 
Like joyous burst of drums, 

In gorgeous gown of gold and black 
The oriole sultan comes ! 



36 THE THRUSH 



THE THRUSH 

The creamy dogwood branches, 

The rosy redbud trees, 
The drifts of sweet wild-plum bloom 

O'erhung by honey bees, 
The gleaming buckeye blossoms 

The south wind blew apart, 
Oh, all the woods awaking, 

They overfilled my heart ! 

Then clear, from out a thicket, 

There rang that golden note 
That flutes from none but only 

The tawny thrush's throat; 
So charged with all sweet secrets 

The April has to tell, 
I bowed my head and harkened, 

Enchanted by its spell. 

Till presently that magic 

Heart-melting melody 
Drew all my soul to meet it 

In sudden ecstasy. 
My spirit found its pinions 

In blessed bird-like birth, 
And knew the joyous passion 

That thrilled through all the earth. 



THE THRUSH 37 



The while the thrush was singing, 

I heard the violets stir, 
And through the dreamy woodlands 

The breaking buds confer; 
I half divined the glories 

Of all the springs to be, 
— When, O, the song was silent! 

The thrush had flown, ah me ! 



3 8 MONTEZUMA 



MONTEZUMA 

On a lofty mountain summit 

In a tawny, desert land, 
Lo, a mighty human profile, 

But not hewn by human hand ; 
In the living rock forever 

Looming dark, majestic, grand. 

O'er its outline, heaven fronting, 
When the dawn's first radiance streams 

With its rosy touch, and tender, 
Then this face of granite seems 

As a sleeper's unawakened 

From the thrall of peaceful dreams. 

But when down the western heavens 
Sinks the setting sun, blood-red, 

Then the mountain mists that mantle 
Cover close that quiet head, 

As men draw a pall of purple 
Round about their kingly dead. 

And the stars, like lighted tapers, 
Flicker forth in golden rows 

From the heaven's holy altar, 
Whilst the night-wind as it blows 

Seems to chant a solemn requiem 
For the passing soul's repose. 



MONTEZUMA 39 



Head of royal Montezuma, 
So the ancient legends tell; 

Montezuma, granite shrouded 
By some great enchanter's spell, 

Lying lordly by the borders 
Of the land he loved so well. 

But in silence unrevealing 

Still that calm face fronts the sky: 
Heeding neither tears nor laughter, 

Nor if sun or storm go by; 
Keeping still its primal counsel, 

In repose, serene and high. 



4 o BETWEEN SEASONS 



BETWEEN SEASONS 

The cherry trees are haunted 
By hordes of robber jays, 

And warmer winds are fanning 
The poppies to a blaze. 

And loosed in fitful flurries, 
The sweet syringas fall, 

To lie like little snow-drifts 
Against the garden wall. 

Upon the laden lattice, 
In softly rounding shapes, 

A wealth of tiny clusters 
Are growing into grapes. 

Heigho! a drowsy shimmer 
Enfolds the sunny hours; 

And humming-birds are hidden 
In scarlet trumpet-flowers. 

The tenderness of springtime 

Is almost overpast; 
But O, the gracious summer, 

It comes, it comes at last! 



A LITTLE LOVE SONG 41 



A LITTLE LOVE SONG 

My heart was like a sunless, cold, 
Unlovely land of ice and snow, 

Wherein no blessed buds unfold, 
Nor singing waters flow. 

Then all at once the April skies 
Laughed in your look, and at that hour 

My spirit melted, torrent-wise, 
My life broke into flower! 

O dearest heart, I had not guessed 

What marvel of immortal seeds 

Lay hidden deep within my breast, 

Beneath its barren weeds ! 

But now I know, but now I know 
The glory of the flower of love, 

The joyous splendor of its glow, 
The subtile pain thereof ! 



42 JUNE 



JUNE 

High overhead, 
By summer breezes sped, 
From every latest burgeoned bough 
The last, spring petals fall; 
And red, red, red, 
Along the garden bed, 
The poppy plants are holding now 
Their crimson carnival. 

Clear, sweet, and strong, 
I hear the robin's song. 
And catch the merry caroling 
Of some bold bobolink ; 

And phlox flowers throng 
The garden ways along, 
While peonies and roses bring 
Their pageantries of pink. 

White, gold, and green, 
The lily spires are seen, 
And hollyhocks, in stately rows, 
With tufted buds are set; 
Tall, in between, 
The growing sunflowers lean, 
And thick the sweet alyssum shows 
Among the mignonette. 



JUNE 43 



Ho! truant May! 
Have you, then, gone astray, 
Unwitting that in realms of June 
Return were no avail? 
Ah, well-a-day ! 
So wings the spring away; 
The summer's ever oversoon, 
But June, sweet June, all hail ! , 



A SONG OF THOUGHT 



A SONG OF THOUGHT 

O, the ships have sails for the swelling gales, 

The falcon flies in the wake of the wind, 
In the speed of the steed of the Bedouin breed 
The blood leaps high to the hoof-beats' lead, 
As the leagues are left behind. 
But what care I 
For the birds that fly, 
Or all the vessels that sail the sea; 
The blasts that blow 
Till the trees bend low, 
Or the barbs of Araby ! 

I spring to birth with the dust of earth, 

Yet span the heaven from pole to pole; 
Or flashing far as the farthermost star, 
I know no barrier, bound nor bar 
To hold from my boldest goal. 
The storm's red spark 
As it cleaves the dark, 
With my viewless wings it can not keep pace : 
More fleet than light 
My measureless flight 
To the starless ends of space! 



IN THE MOONLIGHT 45 



IN THE MOONLIGHT 

The moonbeams filter softly through 
The leaves upon the linden tree; 

And as I sit alone, dear heart, 
My spirit yearns for thee! 

Yet in some gracious-wise to-night 
We do not seem far worlds apart; 

I reach my empty arms and dream 
I fold thee to my heart. 

I close my brimming eyes, and see 
The strange, sweet beauty of thy smile, 

And fancy that our palms are met 
In loving clasp the while. 

In soft, clear tones, I seem to hear 
The long-hushed voice I loved so well ; 

— I tremble, lest a breath should break 
This moment's happy spell ! 

O brother mine, could it be true 
Thine own dear presence hovers near 

To comfort with this heavenly peace 
Thy little sister here? 



46 BINDWEED 



BINDWEED 

Along the lane I idly pass 

Unheeding where the footpath goes, 
And loiter through the ripe wild-grass 
That down the open roadway grows 
In feathery, tall tufts that rise 
In filmy tangles, misty-wise; 
The grass that when the south wind blows, 

Shines out and shows 
Shot through with silver lights and rose, 
And tiny gold and violet seeds 

That quiver off each gleaming stem 
And powder all the wayside weeds, 
And like a glory cover them. 

With eager palms I gently press 

Soft sheaves of it against my lips 
In sheer delight ; and so caress 
And fondle with light finger-tips, 
And watch its beauty when the bright, 

Clear spears of light 
Pierce through its slender leaves and smite 
Their rose and purple, till my sight 
Is dazzled with its loveliness ! 



BINDWEED 47 



In verdant nets along the way 
The tendrils of a wild-grape vine 
Through elder thickets intertwine; 

And poising lightly on a spray 
Of fruited bramble stems where shine 
Close clustering berries, red as wine, 

A little thistle-bird, still gay 

In April's yellow plumage, clings 
With airy grace, and slowly swings, 

And lifts his wings 
In dainty, drowsy flutterings ; 

They flicker like bright flakes of gold, 
And fan his body, small and slim, 

While lovingly the winds enfold 
And summer's heart broods over him. 



The sky is softer than the blue 
Of cornflower buds beneath the dew ; 
And down below 

Upon the marshy meadow swales 

The bindweed weaves its rosy veils 
Where thick the blowing rushes grow 
Among the tasseled reeds and rue; 

And up between the mossy rails 
It lightly climbs, and clambers through 
The growing corn, and barley, too, 

And winds the fallow weeds and trails 
Along the creek where cowslips grew. 



O lavish stems, that fondly fling 
Close clasp about the earth, and cling 



4 3 BINDWEED 



In wreaths of fragrant flowering, 
Ev'n as ye do 

To that dear soil wherefrom ye spring, 
So does my love cleave thereunto ! 
And so my full heart-blossoms bind 
The bright midsummer fields, and find 

Sweet fellowships with everything! 



THE SUMMER SHOWER 49 



THE SUMMER SHOWER 

The air is shot with spangling drops, 

But heedless of the rain 
The sun laughs, through a silver veil, 

Upon the golden grain. 

And lightly arching up the east 

In faintly penciled lines, 
That throb and flush to tinted bars, 

A double rainbow shines. 

It seems to touch the fragrant earth, 

Till, tangled in the breeze, 
It winds a film of irised light 

About the distant trees. 

In frothy clusters down the road 

The blooming elders lean, 
With dripping buds that shine like pearls 

Within a sea of green. 

And heaped around them, pink as shells, 

The roses are in flower, 
While earth and sky are freshly keyed 

To sweetness by the shower. 



50 



AT NIGHT 



AT NIGHT 

Come, draw more near ! Clasp hands with me ! 

Ah close, and closer still ! 
The night spreads to infinity ! 
And through my heart a sudden chill, 
— I pray loose not your loving hold ! — 
A fear, a loneliness untold 
Smites sharply, till mine eyes o'erfill ! 
Nor have I strength nor stress of will 
To set my spirit free. 



The cold, the darkness, and the dread 

Immensity of space, 

The great, wan moon, whose ghostly face 
For ages has been dead, 
The weird lights wheeling overhead, 

The unknown worlds that onward roll, 
In endless wanderings ever led, 

That find no goal, 
The spectral mists that overspread 

With pallid light the lesser stars, 
The lurid glow that glimmers red 

Across the front of Mars, 
— O dearest heart, when all is said, 
I am afraid! and from the whole 

Wide waste of worlds I hide my sight, 

And from the boundless night ! 



AT NIGHT 51 



The ancient mystery of the skies, 

Their silent depths from pole to pole, 
The void, the vastness terrifies! 
— O, let me rather search your eyes, 

And with your sweet, warm touch disperse 
This terror of the universe 
That strikes into my soul ! 



THE HOME FIELDS 



THE HOME FIELDS 

The fields are full of sunlight, 

And leafy golden-green, 
And misty purple shadows 

Are flitting in between; 
The flaky elder flowers 

Are drenched with honey-dew, 
And all the distant woodlands 

Stand veiled in tender blue. 

Half seen between green thickets 

Of grape-vine and wild rose, 
In twinkling swirls of silver 

The lazy river flows; 
While down the grassy roadside 

The milkweed balls are bright, 
And waving prince's-feather 

Is tipped with snowy white. 

Ah, ever-dearest home-land, 

'Tis here my spirit sings! 
And as my heart caresses 

The sweet, familiar things, 
Such rare midsummer magic 

Distills through all the air, 
I think these fields are fairer 

Than any anywhere! 



SYMPATHY 



SYMPATHY 

To-night a little child lies dead; 

I never saw its face; 
I try to fancy now instead 

Its lines of baby grace. 

And for the sake of her who weeps 
These lonely watches through 

So wake fully my spirit keeps 
A weary vigil, too. 

A thousand thoughts appeal to me 

In close-besieging crowd ; 
But through them all I only see 

A little, snow-white shroud. 

Nor may I set dull grief at naught, 

However I am fain; 
Since when the heart-strings are dis- 
traught, 

The will must strive in vain. 

Ah me! there breaks the dawning sun, 

In golden light serene; 
Yet still I mourn this little one, 

Whom I have never seen! 



54 IN SUMMER DEEPS 



IN SUMMER DEEPS 

Through sunny spaces overhead 
A gray hawk's lazy pinions spread, 
And poppies open wide and red 
Where golden harvests grew. 

In rosy wreaths upon the swales 
And fallow fields the bindweed trails, 
And late-sown buckwheat swiftly pales 
To blossoming anew. 

The pond within the pasture land 

Reflects the cattle as they stand 

In depths of dipping sedges and 

Of tangled meadow-rue. 

In silver splashes through the green, 
Fine, filmy spider-webs are seen, 
And crumpled cockle-flowers between 
Are rifts of tender blue. 

On stately stalks of standing corn 
A wealth of cresting plumes are borne, 
And tawny tasseled tufts adorn 
The ripened barley, too. 

So, steeping nature far and wide, 
Deep sweeps the flood of summer-tide. 
Till all things that therein abide 
Are richly tinctured through. 



SONG 55 



SONG 

O, fresh from off the ocean 
The salt wind riots through 

The fragrant fern and bay-leaves 
And dripping honey-dew. 

The morning's on the moorland, 

And flashing, far away, 
I glimpse the foam-white seagulls 

And feathers of the spray. 

O hasten! let us hasten! 

The tide sings up the sand 
The song my heart has harkened 

Across long leagues of land. 

So far, far have I journeyed, 

Such weary ways, O sea ! 
Breathe, breathe me breath of life now, 

And steep the soul of me ! 



56 IMPATIENT 



IMPATIENT 

Some day, when summer's overpast, 
And loosed by frost, in gold and brown 
These greenly clinging leaves drift down, 
When shrill winds hush 
The robin red-breast and the thrush, 
When all the skies are overcast 

With racks of rain, so chill and gray 
Not any burgeoning may be, — 
Some day, 
Across far foreign lands and vast 

Unbounded spaces of the sea, 
So homeward, homeward, journeying fast, 
At last 
She will come back to me ! 

I reckon up, in daily sum, 

The time until that scarlet date; 
I think the fall will never come, 
So wearily I wait! 
The hours seem leaguing to belate 
The days, that never crept so slow; 

And yet, 
I used to love the summer so ! 
But now my heart may only fret 
And pray for it to go. 



IMPATIENT 57 



And yearning so, with lashes wet, 
I half forget 
The greenery on every bough, 
How red the poppies are, and how 
Amid the tufted mignonette 
The scented south-winds gently blow; 
I heed them not, — I only know 

Time never seemed so long as now ! 



I search the azure skies in vain, 
No hint of autumn rain ! 
No hint of fall from bluebirds, nor 
Green fields of growing grain. 
Then idly reckoning, as before, 
I strive anew to make less far 
That glad date on the calendar; 
To number less the days that are, 
The changes fixed for sun and star, 
The moons that yet must wax and wane ; 
Thus evermore 
With fresh impatience, o'er and o'er, 
I count the hours ;— yet still am fain 
To tell them over once again. 



hasten, hasten, autumn days! 

Sear swift this dewy, summer green ! 

1 am grown weary with delays ; 

Speed ! Speed ! 
Bring bitter winds and chill, nor heed 
The mellow sweets between ! 



58 IMPATIENT 



What if the dead leaves strew the ways, 
And southward all the songs take wing? 

Despite all cheerless frosts that be, 
My eager heart awaits the spring, 
So knowing she will surely bring 

The birds and May to me. 



RAIN ON THE RIVER 59 



RAIN ON THE RIVER 

The skies are gray, where far and wide, 

Beyond the water-willows, 
The marshes spread their emerald tide 

Of blossom-crested billows. 

And on the vague horizon's rim, 

In vaporous purple masses, 
The distant woods show soft and dim 

Across the lush, green grasses. 

An east wind stirs the ivory balls 

Upon the button-bushes; 
And hark ! a hidden rain-bird calls 

From out the blowing rushes. 

Within the water, yonder spray 

Of rosy mallow flowers 
Turns faint and pale, till not more gray 

The cloudy heaven lowers. 

And all the birches' tender green 

An ashen hue is growing ; 
While mottled with a silver sheen 

The ruffled waves are flowing. 



60 RAIN ON THE RIVER 

Then softly through the forest leaves, 
That turn, and toss, and quiver, 

The rain, with murmurous cadence, weaves 
A roundel in the river. 

It dots the waves with dancing pearls, 
It gleams, and streams, and twinkles; 

It sweeps and sinks in silvery swirls, 
And rings, and sings, and tinkles. 

The clustering sedges dip and sway, 

Till, after fitful failing, 
The sun bursts gaily through the gray, 

And craggy clouds are sailing 

Where, southward, in a brilliant sky, 

As light as any feather, 
The little moon curves white and high, 

In token of fair weather. 



OVER THE SIERRA 



OVER THE SIERRA 

From out the depths of the abyss, 
Faint echoes of a torrent's roar 
O'er crags whence lordly eagles soar 

To poise above the precipice. 

A dizzy pathway, sheer and steep ; 

A startled catching of the breath ; 

And, bearing menaces of death, 
A loosened snow-drift's sudden sweep ! 

Then, blown from out the upper sky, 
Keen, fitful gusts of icy air, 
So light, so tenuous and rare, 

The heart leaps strangely swift thereby. 

The white moon floating in the calm 
Still ether space, so near, it seems, 
To grasp his eager childhood dreams, 

One need but thither reach his palm. 

A sense of majesties and mights, 

An exaltation born of these ; 

— The summit's awful silences; 
A glimpse of Godhead from the heights ! 



62 ON THE PRAIRIE 



ON THE PRAIRIE 

Across the dewy prairie 

The morning wind is borne, 

Beyond the new-mown hayfields, 
And through the tasseled corn. 

Upon the silver-maples 

It lifts the swinging leaves, 

And steals a subtile sweetness 
From rows of golden sheaves. 

Within the sunny orchard 
The harvest apples fall, 

While from the tossing branches 
The saucy jay-birds call. 

In crinkled, fringy clusters 
The scarlet poppies burn. 

Where, softly opening, eastward 
The yellow sunflowers turn. 

And nibbling in the garden, 
Between the cherry trees, 

I see a robber rabbit 

Among the pink sweet-peas. 



ON THE PRAIRIE 63 

While with a fitful fanning, 

The lazy wind-mill swings, 
About the bloomy peaches 

A robin redbreast sings. 

And in the far horizon 
There dwells such tender hue, 

These azure cornflower blossoms 
Are not so sweet and blue. 



64 BY THE KANKAKEE 



BY THE KANKAKEE 

Beneath the forest trees I lie, 

And watch the deep blue summer sky, 

And count the white cranes floating by 

On level wings; 
And in the undergrowth I hear 
A bittern softly treading near, 
While through the willows, sweet and clear, 

A wood-thrush sings. 

And flashing, plashing, close to me, 
With murmurous, melting melody, 
The swirling, crystal Kankakee 

Flows deep and swift 
Through liquid tints and tones untold 
Of topaz, turquoise, bronze and gold, 
That in its lucent depths unfold 

And drift, and sift, 

Till down among the pearly shells 
A wealth of changeful color dwells ; 
And like a string of silver bells 

The ripples ring 
Through trailing water-weeds that raise 
Their tangled, yellow blossom-sprays 
Where in a green and golden maze 

Tall rushes swing. 



BY THE KANKAKEE 65 

And far across the glassy tide, 

The marshes shimmer, low and wide, 

Where birds and bees and wild things hide 

In reedy grass 
Whose wavering, evanescent hues 
Pale, darken, change, and interfuse, 
Till my enchanted senses lose 

All things that pass, 

And only feel an exquisite 

Glad throb of light and life complete; 

While like some subtile essence sweet, 

The wilderness, 
The perfumes warm of wave and wood 
The silence of the solitude, 
All merge and mingle in my mood, 

Till half I guess 

The secrets that the winds impart, 
And draw so near to nature's heart 
I feel her inmost pulses start; 

While happily 
I sink upon her fragrant breast, 
Like yonder thrush within its nest, 
And deep, entrancing sense of rest 

Steals over me. 



66 THE FISHER FOLK 



THE FISHER FOLK 

I know a little village 

Where fisher folk abide; 
The dark pine woods behind it, 

The southern sea beside. 

There rosy pink crape-myrtles 

In every dooryard grow, 
And through the glossy live-oaks 

The salt sea breezes blow. 

At break of day the fishers 

Sail out to sea to reap 
The harvest that they sowed not, 

The harvest of the deep. 

Then, when their nets are emptied, 
They set their sails for land. 

To heap the shining fishes 
Upon the shining sand. 

Where little barefoot children 

Await them, eager-eyed, 
And play the while with sea-shells 

Cast upward by the tide. 

And all seem so content there, 
From worldly care so free, 

I would that I could find it, 
This secret of the sea! 



THE CACTUS LAND 67 



THE CACTUS LAND 

Land of strange, unearthly beauty, 

Tawny Desert, over me 
Thou hast east the deep enchantment 

Of some subtile sorcery ! 

These thine endless barren reaches 
Where no fruitful harvests grow, 

Unto some bring nameless heartache ; 
But to me thou dost not so! 

Here, where all the air seems newly 
From the springs of life distilled, 

Every breath is like a beaker 
With rare, sparkling rapture filled! 

And my heart exults and glories 
In the strange, compelling power 

Of enchanting, changeful color, 
That is thy supremest dower. 

Joy to me thine ever cloudless 
Sky of purest turquoise hue, 

And thy rosy mountain ranges 
Wrapped in pale, translucent blue. 



68 THE CACTUS LAND 

Beautiful the rainbow ether 
Shifting, shimmering evermore, 

In diaphanous, dazzling splendors 
Over all thy boundless floor, 

Where the low-boughed silver sage-bush 
Softly tufts the tawny land, 

And the tropic Spanish bayonet 
Clusters tall on every hand. 

While for leagues and leagues the cactus, 
Child of sun and sand and bare 

Rainless regions, lifts its columns 
Through the rare, transparent air. 

Wild and splendid in thy freedom, 

Unsubdued as is the sea, 
From the first, O lordly Desert. 

Thou hast drawn my heart to thee ! 

Desolate thou art, and silent, 
Barren both of fruit and flower; 

Yet I love thine arid grandeur 
That defies man's utmost power! 



THE LAST SURVIVOR FROM THE LIFE-BOAT 69 



THE LAST SURVIVOR FROM THE 
LIFE-BOAT 

Beneath his pillow, hid away 
From careless sight, the nurses say, 

And safe from any stranger's view, 
As miser might some treasure rare, 
So does he guard, with jealous care, 
A baby's shoe. 

And evermore by day and night, 
With burning eyeballs fever-bright, 

This wan survivor of the 
Scans each blank, closing wall in turn. 
In dim endeavor to discern 
If sail there be. 

And then the weary sigh that slips 
Suspiring from those parching lips 

No heart may hear nor bleed therefor! 
As, with hot tears that fall like rain, 
He soothes a dying baby's pain 
And o'er and o'er 

Croons snatches of soft lullabies 
To empty arms held cradle-wise. 

— O human heart-break, love and grief ! 
God pity him in his distress, 
Ev'n as the sea was pitiless 
Beyond belief! 



THE LAST SURVIVOR FROM THE LIFE-BOAT 

God comfort, as with straining breath, 
Unheeding either life or death, 

Yet still with faint unwitting smile, 
His fingers fondly seek and fold 
The little sea-stained shoe, and hold 
And stroke the while. 



THE CASCADE RAVINE 



THE CASCADE RAVINE 

From off the traveled road that lay 

Between wide fields of wheat and corn, 
An old gate, gray and weather-worn, 

Led down a shady woodland way. 

One scarce might trace the narrow path, 
So green it was and overgrown 

With springtime's seeded aftermath; 
Tall grasses that had never known 

The mower's scythe or sickle's scath, 
And rosy mayweed lightly sown 
Where'er the summer winds had blown ; 

And all their tangled stems the red 

Sweet clover blossoms overspread. 

Near by, through scented, leafy veils 
Of wreathing vines, and dewy, dense 

Green underwood, a brood of quails 

Sped swiftly past the ragged rails 
That tilted off a mossy fence; 

And over it, on airy wing, 
A robin paused in glad content 
Where budding elder-bushes leant 

And brambles clambered flowering. 



72 THE CASCADE RAVINE 

Then, suddenly, a low, sweet sound 

Rose, faintly quivering on the breeze, 
And all that blossom-studded ground 

Seemed charged with murmurous mysteries ! 

As if all rarest forest keys 
In dreamful chords divinely blent, 
Sang forth from some sweet instrument ; 

While pulsing through, with rhythmic beat, 
In slumberous melodies there went 
The soft susurrus of the trees, 

The wind that wandered through the wheat, 
And all the changeful strains of th< 

And as I listened, marveling 

Where those light, liquid tones might be, 
Forgetting all and everything 

Save that enchanting minstrelsy, 
I wandered slowly through the wood, 

Till all at once the parted green 
Revealed its secret, for I stood 

Upon the verge of a ravine 
Wherein the sunbeams broke between 
Tall rustling hemlock boughs, and bright 
As burnished silver in the light, 

A tiny stream ran tinkling through, 
While hidden somewhere out of sight, 

A little spring made music, too. 

The shining water slipped and slipped 
Adown the mossy rocks, and dripped 

From off fine fringing ferns, in drops 
Of endless threaded pearls that tipped 

The tasseled sedge and alder tops 



THE CASCADE RAVINE 73 

With flickering light,— and then it sipped 
A drowsy draught of sun, and dipped 

Beneath small clustering buds, and hid 

Among lush marigolds, and slid 
Between tall serried ranks of reeds, 
And stroked their little leaves and lipped 
The flower-spangled jewel-weeds; 

Then, speeding suddenly amid 
Faint shimmering spray, it lightly tripped 
Across white pebbly sand, and stripped 

The marsh flowers' gold, and fled, half seen, 

A splash of silver through the green. 

And all the while that music sweet 
Kept softly murmuring at my feet, 

As down the rocks in ceaseless streams 
The limpid cascades poured, and still 
The slumberous light in yellow beams 
Bathed the green hemlock boughs,— until 
I seemed to lose all waking will, 
And all my soul was lulled to dreams ; 
Wherethrough there floated, drowsy-v. 

Bright glints of bird-wings, gracious gleams 
Of tender, sunlit summer skies, 

And fleet, sweet visions of the rare 
Deep, shadowy hearts the forests bear. 



FOREBODING 



FOREBODING 

The scarlet briars trailed across 
The grave I journeyed far to see; 

Upon the stone, half hid in moss, ' 
"Prepare for death, and follow me." 

The birds flew southward down the sky; 

Upon a golden linden tree 
The leaves that fluttered seemed to sigh, 

"Prepare for death, and follow me." 

My father's father slept below 
So dreamless deep and silently, 

I spelled the message soft and slow, 
"Prepare for death, and follow me." 

—Ah me ! 'twas years ago the birds 
Fled swift o'er that far golden tree; 

And wherefore now come back these words, 
"Prepare for death, and follow me"? 



IN LATE SEPTEMBER 75 



IN LATE SEPTEMBER 

Among the hardy marigolds 
The spicy gillyflower unfolds, 
And in the elm a catbird scolds 

With saucy, outspread wings; 
To mellow sweets the pippins speed, 
The sunflower disks are brown with seed, 
And round about them finches feed 

In clinging, yellow rings. 

The latest poppy fires are dead, 

But bright as blossoms overhead 

In shining sheaves of bronze and red, 

The frost-tipped pear leaves show; 
While from their branches blackbirds sing 
Or break to noisy chattering; 
And slender silken cobwebs string 

The tall grass down below. 

Along the uplands, faintly seen 

Across the fallow fields between, 

The winter wheat grows bravely green 

Despite the coming cold ; 
And studding all the stubbled ground 
In tasseled shocks the corn is bound, 
The ripened ears heaped close around 

In piles of purest gold. 



76 /A LATE SEPTEMBER 

To smoky wreaths along the ways 
The newly kindled brush-heaps blaze, 
And filmy veils of purple haze 

Mesh all the amber air; 
Among the fleeces of the sheep 
The yellow sunbeams softly cre< p, 
And sweet contentment, wide and deep, 

Rests gently everywhere. 



SUNNY NOON 77 



SUNNY NOON 

The rose-trees and the barberries 
Are strung with coral beads ; 

And fitful breezes lightly sift 
The ripened poppy-seeds. 

Still, heedless of the nipping frost, 

Along the garden bed 
The white and purple gillyflowers* 

Their spicy fragrance shed. 

And weaving richest tapestries 

LJpOll the lattice frame, 
'I he woodbine laces in and out 

In gold, and rose, and flame. 

Along the wall the grapevines trace 
Their brown and twisted frets, 

And all the trailing clematis 
Is hung with soft aigrettes. 

Through fringes that the larches wave 
The sky shows fair and blue, 

And somewhere, from beneath the eaves, 
I hear the pigeons coo. 

The glory of the noonday sun 

Pervades the dreamy air, 
And the sweet heart of beauty throbs 

In music everywhere. 



7 8 THE GOLDEN WEDDING 



THE GOLDEN WEDDING 

More sweet than all the buds that blow 
Where summer's rarest roses grow, 
More splendid than white lily spires, 
Or shining, scarlet poppy fires. 
Love's fragrant Bower,— even so, 
The blossom of the heart's desires. 

And richer than all fields enfold 
Or all earth's burdened branches hold, 
Than any autumn vintage red. 
Or yellow sheaves new harvested. 
Love's ripened fruit of mellow gold, 
The sum of life, when all is said. 



EARLY NOVEMBER 



EARLY NOVEMBER 

the sweetness of the jangle 
Of the sheep-bells, in the tangle 

Of the wild witch-hazel bushes and the spreading 
red-bud trees ! 
— Ah, the silence when it ceases! 
But the beauty of the fleeces, 
And the soft eyes peering at me through the wood- 
bine lattices ! 

And beyond them, and the network 
Of the dogwood, and the fretwork 
Of the interlacing grapevines, and across the mead- 
ow land, 

1 can see the color showing 
Where the winter-wheat is growing, 

With the com encamped about it like a plumed 
protecting band. 

While among the many-seeded 
Tufts of russet weeds, unheeded, 
Truant ducks go idly twinkling through the yellow 
stubble-field; 
Their white feathers like the glosses 
Of the shining silver bosses 
That adorn the tawny luster of an olden golden 
shield. 



80 EARLY NOVEMBER 

In long loops from off the hedges, 
Trailing downward to the edges 
Of the wayside grass and clover-leaves, fine cobweb 
threads are wound ; 
Fairy clues that lead my eager 
Errant fancy to beleaguer 
Some concealed, enchanted chamber in the richly 
covered ground. 

Till the sun begins the lighting 
Of his western fires, that smiting 
Through the orchard boughs arc splintered into 
spears of ruddy flame; 
An irradiating splend< >r 
That transfigures all the slender 
Little leafless twigs and branches with a glory with- 
out name ! 

O, I know the year is going! 
Neither reaping-time nor sowing 
Will restore the tender beauty of its blossoms that 
are dead : 
Yet T cherish all their sweetness 
Tn the ripeness and completeness 
Of the gold and crimson fruitage that my heart has 
harvested. 



WHEREFORE WINGS? 81 



WHEREFORE WINGS? 

Heigho, sparrow ! Reckless of the rain ; 

When chill the cheerless wind grows, 
Chirping might and main! 

Is it naught, then, when the rose 
Blows again? 

Beating, sleeting on your draggled coat! 

Surely, 'tis enough to drown 
Any happy note 

Nestling in that downy brown 
Little throat. 

Ah me, sparrow ! Had I but your power, 
Think you in the freezing sleet 

1 would waste an hour? 
— I'd sing my sweetest to a sweet 
Orange flower ! 



82 WINTRY TINTS 



WINTRY TINTS 

The sky is like an opal, 

And the horizon's ring 
Is yellow, like a band of gold, 

To hold so rich a thing. 

The wheat-fields are as fleecy 

As any cloud that blows, 
But tawny tufts of standing corn 

Prick lightly through the snows. 

Beside the drift-bound wind-mill 

A pearly shadow plays 
In tones of tender violet, 

And vague, elusive grays. 

And tinged with quiet olive 

The hedges fine and bare. 
Whose thorny masses down the road 

An alien softness wear. 

O, subtile chords of color 

Are fingered by the frost ! 
Though touched and tuned to colder key, 

No grace of earth is lost. 

For see ! a deep red rupy 

The opal heaven grows, 
And yonder pool of ice is one 

Great golden-hearted rose ! 



THE PERFECT FRIENDSHIP 83 



THE PERFECT FRIENDSHIP 

There is a garden so divinely fair 

That in its magic bound, surpassing sweet. 
The gold* n buds, so Persian songs repeat, 

Spring forth immortal in enchanted air; 

But, all, a close there is, more heavenly rare, 
Where, cherished warm within the heart's retreat, 
Love's whitest lilies burgeon to complete 

And fragrant flowering lovely past compare. 

O dearest friend, such lilies have I found 
Within my heart, undreamed-of but for thee! 

Nor any fabled buds of genie's ground 

Are sweeter in their immortality; 
When thou art near, like notes of happy birds, 

My thoughts uprise in songs that need no words. 



84 JANUARY THAW 



JANUARY THAW 

The brook has broken through its gl 
And whore the snows were drifted 

Round tangled blades of last year's grass, 
The yellow sun is sifted. 

Uncovered by the melting night 
And warm, deceiving day-time, 

The myrtle bed is green and bright 
As in the midst of Maytime ! 

I almost fancy that I hear 

The hum of bees in clover, 
And from the maples, glad and clear, 

The fir>t red-robin lover. 

A mock spring laughs in mocking skies, 

(O little buds, be wary!) 
And masking in sweet April's guise 

The youthful year makes merry. 



MORNING ON THE MOUNTAIN 85 



MORNING ON THE MOUNTAIN 

Upon the gray crags, steep and sheer, 
The columbines' gold tassels swing, 
And wind-flowers cln 

Where, lightly poised, the mountain deer 

Drink in the dewy atmosphere 

In long, deep draughts of sun and spring; 

From haunts that know no hunter's snare 
The hermit-thrush and wood-dove wing, 

Whilst through green openings squirrels fare 
And here and there- 
Great, silvery moths go fluttering. 

Along the valley, in a trail 
Of purple light, the mist clouds sail, 
And, soft and pale 

As wreaths of newly risen smoke, 
wrap the red-wood trees and veil 

The topmost crests of pine and oak, 
And balsam boughs and juniper 
Wherethrough the west winds faintly stir 

The underwood, and gently stroke 
The tall young ferns, and smooth the fur 

Of countless happy forest-folk. 



86 MORNING ON THE MOUNTAIN 

Wild little hearts, that throb unknown 
Save to the fondling winds alone, 

Bright eyes, that sparkle free of fear, 

O earth is sweet, and life is dear! 
Here in these forests, still your own, 

In primal peace, this many a year 
God keep you here ! 
Here where across the waking lands 
Young willows wave their bloomy wands, 

Whilst up the heights and far away 
The pine trees climb in singing bands 

And feathery spruces surge and sway 
And clap their cones, like little hands, 
For gladness of the day ! 

Up, up, they clamber on until 

The tenuous air smites keen and chill, 

And far winds blow 
From leagues of everlasting snow ; 
And then the mountain buds, more bold, 
Their .sheaths unfold 
And light their golden fires and glow 
With flame unquenched by frost or cold. 



Whilst ever o'er them, shimmering high 

Against the sky, 
A glittering, crystal radiance streams, 
Wherein the mountain floats and gleams 
Through frosty fleeces, till it seems 
That some great morning star, instead 
Of earth, hangs trembling overhead, 



MORNING ON THE MOUNTAIN 87 

A dream of all most lovely dreams ! 

An airy miracle, overspread 
With veils of silvery tissue spun 
Of ice and mist and snow and sun. 
A dazzle of all lights in one! 

I watch it till, tall towering there 

Through brightening air, 

Such special splendor does it wear 

It seems the sun's own citadel, 

At sight whereof my lips grow dumb 
With joy I find no voice to tell; 

So stricken silent, as with some 
Deep gladness of o'ermastering spell; 
Nor any song of mine may dare 
To follow where 
The summit's utmost radiant peak, 
Bright as God's chosen cherubim, 
Soars through the smiling sky to seek 
And fearless front the face of Him. 



88 THE LITTLE SISTER 



THE LITTLE SISTER 

Along the street a tiny pair 
Of childish figures lately went ; 

The boy's face wore a fearless air, 
The little sister's sweet content. 

He closely clasped her chubby hand, 
And led her through the throng, 
while she 

Seemed perfectly to understand 
He would protect her loyally. 

And as I watched them pass from sight, 
My heart began to ache, for so 

I held my brother's fingers tight 
And toddled down the long ago. 

Then all at once, beyond control, 
The tears uprose in blinding rain, 

Such hopeless yearning stirred my soul 
To lay my hand in his again ! 

LLcfC. 



THE SEA-GARDENS OF SANTA CATAL1NA 89 



THE SEA-GARDENS OF SANTA CATALINA 

Lightly let the boat go drifting, 
Neither hand nor oar uplifting, 
Let no motion fret the ocean, and no sail be now 
unfurled; 

Stranger than Aladdin's story, 
Lo, the dream-surpassing glory 
And the marvel unimagined of the limpid under- 
world ! 

Gaze within the magic mirror 
Of the water, crystal clearer 
Than the gleaming glass enchanted, made by Merlin's 
sorcery 

And behold the secrets hidden 
Through the ages, till unbidden 
Sons of men came sailing, sailing down the blue 
Pacific sea. 

See the pearl-encrusted portals 
Of the caverns, wherein mortals 
Dare not pierce with earthly vision, dare not fare 
with feet profane; 

Coral-columned halls with golden 
Thrones in emerald deeps withholden, 
•Lit with sparkling amber splendor, where the merry 
mermen reign. 



5 o THE SEA-GARDENS OF SANTA CATALINA 

See the long kelp banners flying 
From their gardens underlying 

All the rare, transparent surface of this sunny, south- 
ern sea; 

Grasses, shot with silver spangles, 
Wreathed and caught in starry tangles 

Of the purple ocean-pansy and the fringed anemone. 

And the brilliant sea-weeds scattered 
Like a gay mosaic shattered 
In a million shining fragments over all the ocean 
floor; 

While the bright-hued fish go darting 
In swift journeys, meeting, parting, 
Weaving gold and scarlet patterns through the water 
evermore. 

Through the light that throbs and quivers 
Down the depths, and breaks and shivers 
Into splintered flakes of brightness, that so melt and 
interfuse 

Into all such strangest ranges 
Of translucent color changes, 
That the eye is thrilled, bewildered, with their rare 
enchanting hues. 

— Ah, would thus upon the gleaming 
Southern sea, in happy dreaming, 
We might drift and drift forever! never shoreward 
guide the keel! 

Azure skies, forever smiling, 
Into visions sweet beguiling, 
And beneath our boat the splendor of those rosy 
dreams made real ! 



